


An Intricate Mask

by Capucine



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Narcissistic Batman, Bittersweet Ending, Canon Temporary Character Death, Child Abuse, Dark, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Mindfuck, Narcissism, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-12
Updated: 2016-03-12
Packaged: 2018-05-26 05:21:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6225616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Capucine/pseuds/Capucine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Bruce Wayne was not what he seemed to be? What if Batman was secretly abusive, but excellent at hiding it? </p><p>Dick knows what's happening is wrong. But no one will believe him--not in time, probably not ever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Intricate Mask

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fucked up story. Narcissistic Personality Disorder is kind of what Bruce has here, but just to be clear, that's mainly because this is drawn from my experience with NPD abusers.
> 
> WIth NPD, which is a Cluster B personality disorder, there was a lot less security in childhood, whether because of trauma, general familial instability, or other factors. Abuse often factors in heavily, which is why it can be passed down. It's not genetic, as far as can be told.
> 
> The main issue with NPD is that reality is too frightening for the person. They are extremely insecure and have very low empathy. However, they often figure out how to be very charming and fit within the rules.
> 
> When NPD is not treated or helped or what have you, it can lead to a person being abusive. Not always, as no disorder guarantees one being abusive, but the kind of abuse inflicted by someone with NPD can be a bit unique in its mindfuckery.
> 
> Someone who is frightened of reality may believe in an unreality in an attempt to comfort themselves. The part where it gets abusive is when they use those they have control over (especially kids) to force that unreality, which may include trying to force love from them. 
> 
> In this case, Batman is this.

Dick had probably been the first to realize something was _off_ about Bruce Wayne. He didn’t know what at the time, his vocabulary and experiences limited to _loving_ and _trusting_ and _safe_ when it came to family and parents.

Bruce was beyond what he could understand as a nine year old child.

Since Bruce almost never smiled, since Batman didn’t, he did his best to be silly and smiling and fill the dour, dark spaces of his new home and family with light.

“Holy unfriendly mobs, Batman!”

And the other heroes found it amusing, cute. He was a small child and he knew how to entertain better than anything.

Funny part was, they thought he’d chosen to be Robin.

Funnier part was, he had thought that too.

Looking back, he could see the manipulation, the little things to make him choose Bruce’s choice piled up—it was impossible to explain. Mentioning Zucco and how he wished he’d been able to avenge his parents. Surreptitiously allowing glimpses of Batman and his life. Latching on to the Robin thing, the nickname his mother had had for him.

A traumatized, alone child like Dick hadn’t stood a chance.

When he left, angry and refusing contact with Bruce, the superhero community was shocked—and much of them were quick to console Bruce or express their astonishment at the way Dick was behaving.

Only Dick’s friends understood. Or, they liked him better than Bruce and would gladly stand by him.

He thought it was over.

But a puppeteer isn’t happy without puppets.

\--

Jason had stood even less of a chance than Dick.

Desperate to be loved, to have a father, he eagerly fell into the role that Dick left. Sure, he had his rough edges, but Bruce was doing his best to smooth them out.

By which Dick meant that he was trying to make Jason Dick—and not the real Dick Grayson, either, instead the vision that Bruce had intended from the beginning before Dick had rudely escaped.

And Dick had done little. Had talked to Jason a little, only to find Bruce had manufactured a rivalry between them. He could do nothing to get Jason to leave, and where would the kid even go? Dick didn’t dare suggest moving in with him, scared of the commitment and the wrath and the exposure.

So he would show up every so often, work with Jason, try to soften the anger that was directed towards him. He knew it was Bruce, that the micro-controlling and put downs and earned, tiny scraps of love or affection were enough to drive anyone insane.

What Jason desperately wanted was to be loved. And Bruce used that against him.

When Jason died, Dick had just gotten to the stage of affectionate nicknames—Little Wing, Jaybird—and was just that much less frightened of this biting him in the ass.

It did.

He came screaming at Bruce, furious that he would allow this to happen, that he would withhold information on the funeral, the memorial, the _death_ of Jason—and Bruce turned it all back on him, punching him in the face.

Didn’t Dick see how much this was killing him? How could he be so goddamn selfish? He left for a reason, didn’t he? He wanted nothing more to do with him or related others.

And Dick had left in disgust, emotional agony, that feeling of ‘the game’ starting up again.

He knew there would be no justice for Jason. 

He just hoped the others, the superhero community, would see Bruce for what he was and not let this happen again.

One Robin a runaway. The other dead. They had to see the pattern—and the link.

\--

Bruce made Jason an unfortunately troubled kid he just couldn’t save. He made him the cautionary tale. He made him free license to hurt people in his grief.

And Dick just couldn’t. Couldn’t think about it, couldn’t deal with it without feeling like vomiting.

He felt responsible. Like he should have done something, gotten Jason out of there somehow. Like he was supposed to save him and he _didn’t_.

While Bruce went on fairly visible ‘unnecessary force’ sprees, Dick sank into a quiet depression, doing his job as Nightwing and as a cop and not much else. His relationships, what little there were, suffered—Babs finally, quietly stopped talking to him, Roy faded into addiction, Wally kept trying to get ahold of him and he kept ignoring his calls.

Kori helped him get through. She was a smart, compassionate woman, and she got him back to talking to Wally, to interacting and feeling again. To face his grief and pain.

She was his confidante.

And about that time, Tim showed up. A child asking him to return to Gotham, to Batman, because ‘Batman needs a Robin.’

And Dick bit back, ‘He might, in the sense that a snake needs prey—I need to be far away from him.’ Because Tim was a child and would not understand. He sent him away with a no.

And he wished so much he’d explained why he’d said no, had enlightened Tim.

Hadn’t failed another brother.

Because that kid decided to take his place. To be the sacrificial lamb without knowing what that entailed or that he was a sacrificial lamb. And it was Dick’s fault again for not protecting him from Bruce.

This time, though, he was going to do the right thing. He was going to save Tim.

First, he tried to talk him out of it, coming back to Gotham to do so. The boy had looked at him with starry eyes, but still firmly told him no, he was needed here, Batman needed a Robin.

And Dick appealed to Superman next to do something. To somehow not let Bruce take on another Robin.

And somehow, Superman had come away with astonishment at Dick’s level of pettiness. Had said that grief was no excuse to hurt his former partner this way. They were all upset about Jason, but it was bound to happen—he’d met Jason, hadn’t he? The boy was impulsive, rash, hotheaded—came from the streets. If this new Robin was nothing like him, he’d be fine.

And he told Bruce.

Bruce had his tenterhooks in Dick once again, and the name of those hooks? Timothy Jackson Drake.

Dick had to be around now if he wanted to protect Tim. Had to do as much to intervene as he could. As Bruce pushed a new image onto Tim—the anti-Jason. Used the late Robin’s ghost as a measuring stick.

It made Dick angry, but he had to navigate carefully. Tim still believed this was how things were supposed to be, that he was needed—and that was apparently a huge deal to Tim. Something that Bruce used to his advantage, threatening to send him home packing at every turn.

He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t have a Robin then—Babs was distant now, as Oracle and a power in her own right.

Tim would take it because it was what he knew, Dick found out—Tim’s own parents tended to show even less affection and desire to have him around than Batman. Bruce couldn’t have chosen better if he’d tried.

Tim suffered through the deaths of his parents with mainly Bruce for support, despite Dick trying to be there and protect him in the emotionally vulnerable moment. But Bruce was there to make himself the _only_ support, the only person who truly mattered in Tim’s life.

And then came Jason, back from the dead and pissed as hell.

Tim nearly died at his hands, and Bruce got to tell everyone that Jason was pit-mad, was affected so horrifically by his death and resurrection and there was nothing he could do, but they couldn’t expect him to raise a hand against his child.

As if there was no reason for Jason to be messed up and _need help_ , like he’d had nothing to do with Jason’s fury, which seemed to know no bounds.

He dressed up as Nightwing at one point, but Dick managed to talk him down from dishonoring his reputation, get him to see he wasn’t completely alone.

Or so he thought. Jason was difficult to work with at best, was in more pain than Dick could probably comprehend.

Kori got involved with him, along with Roy. They became a kind of team, a group of castoffs in many ways.

\--

Then along came Damian, and he very nearly killed Tim.

The fact that Damian was allowed to stay after this crushed Tim, not to mention the trauma of nearly being killed when he very much didn’t expect it. Dick was pretty sure Tim could weather anything he could prepare for.

He hadn’t been prepared for Damian by any stretch of the imagination, and all the years spent carefully navigating Bruce and Batman and keeping an even keel came crashing down.

Damian was definitely not who Bruce wanted as Robin. He was not easily malleable, had enough emotional baggage to fill a train, and Dick wasn’t certain the kid had empathy at all.

Tim was a mess, and on the very bitter upside, he started talking to Dick. He started talking to Jason. The manufactured rivalry had not been thoughtfully put in place, as that wasn’t Tim’s goad. And Tim finally had a chance to understand normal, to understand a fragile, vibrating fear in the chest as a constant was not normal.

And Bruce didn’t bemoan Tim in the same way as Jason when he became somewhat absent from the superhero community. Didn’t mention him if no one else brought him up.

He only gave a sigh, and said something about how he wished he could reach the boy, but that he needed space. There was nothing Batman could do about it but wait.

Tim had always been a touch unstable, delicate in the mind, and he needed to heal on his own time.

Like being nearly killed was nothing. But no one knew that whole story—until Tim got back with his team, with the Titans, and started healing.

And the anger was directed towards Damian by the team, Tim around or not—preferably not.

Which, to Dick, was a little backwards. Damian was a child, and clearly had little idea of morality or, at the time, why it was wrong.

Bruce knew. Bruce chose the way things had played out.

And no one blamed him, as he made veiled comments about his uncontrollable child, about how bloodthirsty he was and he couldn’t really do anything but keep him because otherwise he’d kill other people.

And Damian suffered silently now, except when he was taking out his rage on criminals. Because Dick could tell the boy was desperate to prove himself to Bruce, and every inch that Damian climbed, Bruce simply put the goal, the approval, a little higher.

The child had easily made himself ostracized by the community by his treatment of Tim, his background, and general attitude. Bruce was all there was—and Bruce made sure he knew it.

\--

The miracle happened when Bruce died.

Suddenly, he was gone, leaving a gaping hole—but the good kind, in Dick’s opinion, like a tumor that was cut out.

And that left Dick the only one who would—could, take responsibility for Damian.

And be Batman.

He wanted to destroy the suit. He wanted, more than almost anything, to retire the mantle of Batman. But they talked him into it, convinced him it was for the best of the city—and they didn’t understand his animosity towards the suit. 

Batman was a great man. He should be proud to carry on his legacy. Who else had he expected to grow up to be?

And Tim.

Tim took off, sure Bruce wasn’t dead and that he could find him. That he could fix this, repair the hole in his chest where Bruce (And Steph, and Bart, and Conner) had been. So sure, and Dick could only send Cassandra Cain after him, the quiet orphan who hung out on the fringes of their family but refused to get too close to Bruce. Just remain neutral enough to continue operating and being fed.

He felt like she knew the whole time what was happening with clarity, but had no words to express it. Even when Babs took her in, trained her up as Batgirl properly, she never spoke much.

It took Tim a year.

It was a trying year, the kind that was worse than almost anything Dick had been through—but it was genuine, and he would take that any day over the falsities Bruce had always perpetuated.

Damian made progress. Started to express empathy, started to express affection, even, and an understanding of morality—started.

In spite of how people in their community treated him. Tim’s former teammates, the ‘good, responsible’ adult heroes, almost everyone who considered themselves good.

And he was getting to a place where he could relax at night to sleep. Where he could trust Dick.

And Tim succeeded.

Tim succeeded, and Jason called Dick up cussing his head off and sinking into hyperventilating sobs. Because Bruce was supposed to be _gone_ , it wasn’t fair.

And the Bruce that came back was worse than ever.

He had been affected by his time in a time bubble, and treated Damian worse than before, in spite of his progress, thanking Dick for keeping his mantle warm, but he was back now and would take back over.

Damian had cried briefly at Dick, a few tears running down his cheeks, before his face hardened, and his eyes suggested that he had been right all along about not ‘becoming soft.’

Jason kept calling him with recurring nightmares, repeating over and over that the others just didn’t understand, couldn’t get it, he’d been there, _he knew_ , he had to tell Bruce to leave him alone, not mention him ever again, he was finally doing okay, _please_ \--

And Tim was briefly elevated to favorite child, but fell again like a ceramic vase, shattering when he was put aside once more.

When he wasn’t given Robin back or treated like he existed or mattered, after the first week or so.

And by shattered, Dick meant that all too literally.

\--

Tim’s funeral was much the same as Jason’s in a lot of ways, from what Dick had been told of Jason’s.

There was nothing Batman could have done to save Red Robin. His personal demons were too great, and he only wished he’d been around during the year he truly went downhill to save him. That there had been something he could have done. That _someone_ would have done something. 

If only he could have been there.

And Dick fought throwing up. Jason wasn’t even there, Damian was seated far away, Cassandra hung around the back edges of the crowd.

But Dick knew, that was two. One was perhaps a coincidence, even if he knew it wasn’t in this case. Technically, it was three, not two, because Steph had been Robin for almost a week in order to teach Tim a lesson—and she had died during that week, because Bruce didn’t give a shit about her.

One, maybe coincidence. Two, a tragedy. Three? That was a pattern.

And one that had to be stopped.

Dick did not care if he ended up locked up for it. If he died. He had to protect Damian, had to protect Jason, Cass, and any other child that Bruce might come across. Anyone else who might suffer from his actions.

Cass and him did it quietly.

Bruce Wayne, multibillionaire and playboy white knight of Gotham, passed away quietly in his sleep, seemingly suffering an aneurysm, presumably from the tragedy of losing his son for a second time.

There were a few suspicious looks, but no one could prove anything, and were not completely willing to believe that Dick, or anyone besides Jason, would really want to murder their father.

So Bruce was laid to rest.

And so were the ghosts of his parents, all that had driven him onwards in this battle, in this choice of lifestyle and the agony and pain he’d rent in his wake.

Damian and Dick disappeared from the superhero community, settling in Minnesota, near a lake. Damian didn’t like it at first, was a bit furious and yet much more soothed than before, but he grew to like it, to relax, to be the child he was never allowed to be.

Jason had a chance to heal, left the mercenary life, and ended up becoming a mechanic, writing stories on the side that used all that knowledge in his brain. He was at peace working away on vehicles and unloading his mind at night.

Cass discovered religion, and entered a religious order by the time she was 28. She went by Sister Rita Timothy—one the patron saint of impossible causes, and one the saint with the same name as Tim.

She often Skyped with them on the old computer at the convent, the lag creating some interesting freeze frames at times.

Babs continued on in the superhero community, not much in contact with any of them. It was probably healthier that way.

Bruce Wayne was gone, and so was the terror in the night.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, that was cathartic.
> 
> As someone who lives with a narcissist, this was personal-ish. Public image is everything. Perception matters more than reality.
> 
> Cass's potential storyline way back was that she would discover religion and embrace it whole-heartedly, though that was abandoned. I thought I'd use it.
> 
> Jaybird...I feel so bad for him. He makes me think of my twin in this story.
> 
> And Tim. :( I am sorry.
> 
> Edit: Also, I do want to make it clear that Cluster B personality disorders do not make someone a monster. It's still very much someone's choice what to do with that, and they're not forced to be abusive.


End file.
